The County Scene - Week 5: Unicorns mount up

OK, this post is not about the Unicorns that I play for, sadly the west coast weather put paid to our tie with the Glasgow boys. No - this week sees the first match in the ECB 40 for a bunch of guys without first-class contracts and quite frankly I find the squad name an infringement of copyright. The Sports Union lawyers are on the case as we speak. Some of the players are fairly talented, such as former Somerset all-rounder Wes Durston, ex-Gloucestershire bowler Mark Hardinges and university prodigy Zoheb Sharif. I expect they'll upset a few teams but will not make any serious waves in the competition.

Anyway - here are the results from this week's first-class matches:

Championship Division 1

Durham 384 (Blackwell 83, di Venuto 71, Kabir Ali 5-98) and 262-5 (Coetzer 72, Blackwell 62) beat Hampshire 345 (Carberry 113, Adams 68, Plunkett 4-107) and 298 (Pothas 76) by 5 wickets

Lancashire 312 (Horton 123, Moore 61, Croft 56, Masters 4-81) and 38-2 beat Essex 176 (ten Doeschate 55*, Anderson 6-44) and 173 (Cook 50) by 8 wickets

Kent 317 (Stevens 92, Bresnan 5-52) and 357-8d (Hockley 82, van Jaarsveld 78, Tredwell 72*, Jones 53) drew with Yorkshire 283 (Bairstow 70, Rashid 59, Azhar Mahmood 4-58) and 300-5 (Lyth 84, Bresnan 70, Sayers 61, McGrath 55)

Nottinghamshire 250 (Franks 61, Amla 58, Willoughby 4-40) and 250-8 (Wagh 70, Amla 64*) beat Somerset 272 (Trego 66) and 227 (Trescothick 98, Wright 78, Broad 5-89) by 2 wickets

Championship Division 2

Derbyshire 363 (Smith 165*, Park 61, Harrison 4-53) and 121-2 (Rogers 51*) beat Glamorgan 272 (Wright 60, Wallace 58, Allenby 57, Jones 4-60) and 211 (Rees 102, Smith 4-66) by 8 wickets

Sussex 152 (Franklin 4-27) and 302 (Martin-Jenkins 102*, Thornely 64) beat Gloucestershire 128 (Rana Naved 4-49) and 119 by 207 runs

Northamptonshire 307 (Peters 62, Boje 61*, Sales 55, Evans 5-87) and 395-4 (Peters 183*, Wakely 87) beat Middlesex 442-8d (Simpson 101*, London 77, Robson 52) and 258-3d (Newman 112, Malan 56*) by 6 wickets

Surrey 495 (Davies 137, Hamilton-Brown 125) and 239-8d (Ramprakash 82, Davies 69*) drew with Worcestershire 465 (Moeen Ali 126, Solanki 114, Smith 80, Kervezee 68, Scott 55) and 170-8 (Moeen Ali 70*)

University Match

Leicestershire 411-7d (du Toit 154, Taylor 56) and 285-2d (Jefferson 101*, Naik 72, Cobb 55) drew with Cambridge Uni 190 (Wheater 55, Woolley 55, Naik 4-24) and 116-1 (Ackland 51*)

For the Victoria Sponge Lad of the Week Award, I have looked at the Clydesdale 40 matches to select my shortlist. Here they are:

Jacques du Toit (Leicestershire) - for a massive 141 of 122 balls in a 47 run win over Notts

James Kirtley (Sussex) - 8 overs 4-30, including a triple-wicket maiden to restrict Worcester to 144-9. Sussex knocked off the runs in quick time to win by 5 wickets

Andrew Gale (Yorkshire) - 125 off 115 as the skipper led his side to victory chasing 233 against Essex with no losses

THE WINNER - All I will say is - record stand - Andrew Gale - LAD.

In other news, Durham, Somerset and Gloucester all comfortably defended decent totals, Surrey edged out Lancashire in an exciting encounter at Whitgift School and Middlesex and Warwickshire also started their campaigns with victory.

Next week I'll do a bit more of an insightful entry, just tried something a bit different this week - we are a work in progress, as you well know!
RM